Charles In Charge! How He Pulled The Pin On Andrew

The king-to-be makes his royal decree

With scandal engulfing his family at home, Prince Charles could have been forgiven for cancelling engagements or cutting short his tour of New Zealand.

But the consummate royal, who travelled the country with his wife the Duchess of Cornwall before a solo trip to the Solomon Islands, never missed a beat.

Smiling and chatting to wellwishers at every stop, he gave no hint of the crisis plaguing the monarchy after his brother Prince Andrew’s disastrous TV interview about his links to billionaire paedophile Jeffrey Epstein.

But Woman’s Day can reveal that behind the scenes of the much-lauded tour, every spare moment was spent on the phone as he consulted with his 93-year-old mother the Queen, Prince William and senior palace aides.

While he listened to every opinion on the matter, sources say that, in the end, it was the king-in-waiting pulling the strings, insisting that the only course of action was to strip his younger brother of his royal duties. Not since Edward VIII had a member of the royal family been forced to resign.

Our source says that the 71-year-old acted “boldly and with decisiveness”, concerned only with protecting the monarchy from further damage. And in a scene that could have come straight from an episode of Netflix drama The Crown, Charles is said to have told his mother, “Andrew has to go. It is the only way.”

“Charles stepped up in a big way and his actions are being seen as a pivotal moment in terms of the Queen handing over the baton,” tells our insider.

“She has been involved in discussions but almost entirely left the final decisionmaking to Charles, who dealt with the problem swiftly, firmly and without allowing emotion to get in the way. To say she is proud of him is an understatement.”